I don't see a mold less than .308 in my catalogs from Lee, Lyman, etc. It looks like you would have to have a mold custom machined. As for bc I don't know. One of those things you have to fire over a cronograph to see. Plus, a round ball does not conform to the G1 factor used in PointBlank. It's one of the other G factors especially for round balls.

_________________Safe shooting,
Chris Young, aka: popgun, Moderator
I don't know everything but I have made most of the mistakes already and lived through many of them.

I don't see a mold less than .308 in my catalogs from Lee, Lyman, etc. It looks like you would have to have a mold custom machined. As for bc I don't know. One of those things you have to fire over a cronograph to see. Plus, a round ball does not conform to the G1 factor used in PointBlank. It's one of the other G factors especially for round balls.

You can find them but they are for lead weights and not LRB for shooting.
They weigh only 16 grains when they are pure lead and less for wheel weight or tin allows. If you load them at velocities that won't destroy them You can't get much hunting done. The BC of round balls depends on their diameter. The smaller the ball the lower the BC. It also decreases with velocities up to 2200 fps and then will start to increase (slightly) at velocities above that. The pure lead will tear itself apart before you reach the velocity that the BC begins to increase (hypersonic).
At realistic velocities - 1200 to 2000 fps you can use these 16 grain balls to hunt ground squirrels to a full size squirrel or medium sized rat. At extremely close range you might kill a cat (house cat) if it was placed just right but you have to wonder how accurate the small balls will be when they tend to climb up and left or up and right depending on the rifling twist direction.
It is a lot more fun to use LRB in a 36 caliber rifle - at least then you are shooting a 22 equivalent - 40 grains at 1200 fps

Rifling is not an issue Paul, it's a smoothbore! I would have guesstimated the weight of a ball at something around 25 grains, I have air rifle pellets that weigh 18! (have tried them with a blank behind them too!)

_________________There are few problems in life that cannot be solved with sufficient high explosive........

Rifling is not an issue Paul, it's a smoothbore! I would have guesstimated the weight of a ball at something around 25 grains, I have air rifle pellets that weigh 18! (have tried them with a blank behind them too!)

Delboy,

I have both calculated the weight of the 22 cal LRB and looked it up in a reference manual (Hodgdon's 25th data manual, pg 519) and come up with this:

I suggest that you re-guess your projectile weight. Pellets are larger than round balls. Without rifling to twist the ball your accuracy is going to be non-existant. The small balls will wobble around in the air like a knuckle ball does. Even at extremely short ranges the pellets are unlikely to even produce a "pattern". I wish you well on your venture but the whole reason for the success of rifled bores is the inadequacy of balls that don't spin to stabilize them.

Basically Paul, I am trying to make a cross between an air rifle and a rifle. A friend who I shoot with in South Africa has a Ruger 10/22 which, with a silencer, is the quietest gun I have ever heard. The loudest bit about it is the click of the action when you pull the trigger and the snick of the bolt when chambering another round. I have a shotgun licence and am restricted to smoothbore weapons in England, so I got this crappy little .22 Anschutz that has had the rifling stripped out of it - thus making it legal for me to own and use. I have also got some .22 shotshells which are devastating on a mouse at 5 feet, but not much further. I figured to empty the 30 grains of #12 shot (dust) out of them and replace it with a more robust shot size - keeping to the 30 grains. Then I figured, what if I put a single .22 ball in one.................. Hmmm. Why not just get a rifle? Getting a licence over here is a bitch, especially if you don't live in the countryside. I have a RIGHT to own a shotgun but a rifle is a PRIVILEGE that must be earned and showing good reason for NEEDING one is just one of the qualifications necessary.

_________________There are few problems in life that cannot be solved with sufficient high explosive........

Ok, England explains it all!
My brother and I did some work with 12 and 20 ga shotguns using LRB with different "tails" made from nylon, wool, and cotton to get them to fly straight but in a 22 caliber you have problems putting a tail in place.
Are you by chance a machinist or have access to a small lathe? A good drill would work if you are handy making small metal parts with a drill and drills, files and such.
A steel cup with thin walls and a lead tip would be a good "dart" type of slug that would fly straighter than a lead ball. The steel cup would be open at the back and the lead tip moulded to the cup in any shape you liked would be more dynamically stable than a slug from a standard shotgun. If you kept the overall weight down to 35 grains or so it should shoot well from a 22 smoothbore. ???? OK, I have some reservations about it but it looks good on paper - sort of.
I may try to draw it up on my CAD program and see what would be involved in making these projectiles. Might even see if one could use lead wire - but I think pure lead would just blow the skirt off the projectile.

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